????IT’S the first time in years that Hollywood movies are screened in Chinese theaters during the summer blockbuster season. ????For years, regulators have imposed a blackout on foreign-film imports during the peak summer season. Known as a domestic movie protection period, the policy was designed to boost the local industry by giving Chinese-made movies an uncontested run at cinemas during the summer school break, which lasts roughly from late June through August. Additional blackouts are instituted during Chinese New Year in February and during the Golden Week holiday in October. ????Last year’s summer blackout ran June 19 to Aug. 23. It had the desired effect: Raman Hui’s CGI-live-action fantasy “Monster Hunt” grossed US$385.2 million to become China’s then-biggest film ever, and other local pictures like “Monkey King” and superhero spoof “Pancake Man” earned over US$150 million each. ????But regulators have loosened their grip this summer. According to precedents set in recent years, “Independence Day: Resurgence,” released June 24, should have been the last Hollywood tentpole to market, but instead Paramount’s “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows” was granted a July 2 release date. More surprisingly, Warner Bros.’ “The Legend of Tarzan” has been scheduled for Tuesday — Alexander Skarsgard and Margot Robbie were in Beijing promoting the movie Thursday night — and Universal’s “The Secret Life of Pets” is set for Aug. 2. Chinese production companies will then get a reprieve until “Ice Age: Collision Course” comes out Aug. 23 and “Jason Bourne” bows Sept. 1. ????Insiders say two factors are behind the policy shift. ????“There are two stats that matter to the people who make these decisions,” a Beijing-based executive told The Hollywood Reporter, asking not to be named. “One is the market share of foreign films versus local movies, and the other is the overall growth rate at the end of the year — the second stat is probably slightly more important,” the executive adds. ????In the first quarter of 2016, Chinese films did historic business. Led by Stephen Chow’s “The Mermaid,” which earned US$528 million from China alone, local movies accounted for nearly 75 percent of the box office over the quarter, fueling year-over-year growth of 51 percent. This big early lead likely gave regulators confidence that Chinese movies would maintain at least more than 50 percent market share by year’s end, which the Central Government is understood to insist upon. ????But the second quarter presented an almost opposite picture. For the first time in over five years, the overall Chinese box office shrank for a full quarter, slipping nearly 5 percent compared with the same period in 2015. ????Insiders say regulators may have let a few Hollywood titles in this summer to hedge against the possible continued under-performance of local movies. “In the absence of very strong Chinese movies, if you put in a two-month blackout, the theaters are going to struggle and that’s bad for the industry,” says the Beijing executive. ????In 2015, the box office grew an eye-popping 48 percent in China, leading to widespread predictions that the country would surpass North America as the world’s largest theatrical territory in 2017. ????(SD-Agencies) | 